by Samantha Weaver

• In this season of bitter partisan rivalries, it would be well to remember the following sage observation : “Do not trust to the cheering, for those persons would cheer just as much if you and I were going to be hanged.”The man who first made that observation was Lord Protector of England Oliver Cromwell, considered by some to be a hero of liberty, by others to be a regicidal dictator. He died in 1658, probably from septicemia.